Thursday, November 06, 2008

A squealing thank you to Aspi for sending me this clip of the look-alike special of the tv show Boogie Woogie. "Shashi" and "Amitabh" dance to "Jaanu Meri Jaan" from Shaan (about 5 minutes in). It's so fun! The Shashi hair, head wobbles, flailing arms, and scrunchy jaw-line wild grin are perfect, and I agree with Aspi that the dancer nailed Shashi's "jerky sashay" (which henceforward, in the assemblage-loving wordplay style of this blog, shall be called "Shashay," or possibly "Shashé" if he is in a very dandy role).

Earlier in the clip, I also enjoyed "Salman"'s gigantic shoes and side-to-side step-aerobics moves.

Aside to "Shashi": would you like an unpaid job hanging out in my living room and dancing along to movies and occasionally doing intense dramatic interpretations of the cultural tribulations of the firangi ladki/Hindustani ladka relationship (cf. Merchant/Ivory/Jhabvala) and venturing down a mine shaft to save stranded workers? You would? Swell!

The omission from "Shahrukh" from all of our comments makes me assume that you feel as I did, that the SRK guy really could have been better. I felt like I was watching Shahid Kapoor pre-Jab We Met.

Did anyone explore all the other clips? I'm so amused by the idea of Sunny and Bobby Deol here.

Banno - Yeah! The guy had everything in the mouth/chin area just right, especially how Shashi's chin gets super scrunchy when he smiles in certain ways or pulls his head back in surprise. It's such a weird morph, and he does it so well.

If he takes the job, you will certainly be updated. How could I not document such an experience?!?

Hi Bth - the SRK guy was OK but he just did the basic reognisable moves and didn't really inject the personality into his routine. I enjoyed the Salman and the Shashitabh so much more because they really went for it and played as caricatures rather than attempting to be credible, and so I could laugh rather than cringe. I dunno. I guess it's like Elvis impersonators. Not for everyone.

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